


different eyes see different things

by ansonwish



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: 3+1 Things, Adam and Bobby are the best ghost hunters in the world, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Ghost Hunters, Banter, Gen, Ghost Hunters, Ghosts, Haunted Houses, Kyle is a fucking idiot, Roddy ruins fun things for everybody, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-20
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2019-06-12 03:36:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15330867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ansonwish/pseuds/ansonwish
Summary: Adam's biggest goal when he created the show was to prove the existence of the supernatural. Through circumstances beyond his control, this goal is becoming much harder to achieve than he thought.Or: three times the cast ofUndisputeddidn't catch a ghost on camera — and one time they did.





	1. little dolls

The wiry moss tangles through the cracked windows and clings to the brick. The front door is rotting away from its hinges, and its window has been smashed. Inside, the grand foyer is littered with pieces of glass. It's a nightmare to look at, and even more of a nightmare to be inside, but there was a job to do.

Which is precisely why Adam loved the place as much as he did when he saw the pictures online. The thing with new houses was that they lacked character. They seemed so similar, and nothing really seemed personal. When his job had less to do with the house itself and more to do with what still lived inside there, character was incredibly important. The decrepit look was in now for ghost hunters.

Adam didn't take much convincing when it came to ghosts. He had believed in their existence for a very long time, and he wasn't about to just give up on that belief as he got older. Turning a childhood belief into a career was much more fun than tying himself up in a boring job. _Undisputed_ was just an idea he had that seemed to grow bigger than originally planned.

Plus, having the best team in the world just made it all the more fun. Him and his best friends, tracking down haunted places across the state to investigate — what more could he have asked for? Sure, Roddy tended to be a little more skeptical, but skeptics made the show interesting. Their web show got so much more attention than they expected, and people were drawn to their respective personalities more. 

He definitely could have dealt with the worst looking places in the world if it meant doing what he loved every day of his life. Adam seemed to have a penchant for finding the worst places in the world to work out of.

“I’m not into this place. It's the dustiest one we’ve ever seen.” Kyle griped about the dust for the third time that night, wheezing out a cough that was a little more than dramatic.

“Nobody’s into this place, Kyle.” Roddy says.

“I am!” Adam calls from down the hall, giving a wave back to his team. Bobby, from behind the camera, waves back. 

“I think everyone now that by now. You did set this up.” Adam’s proud of himself, even if his team isn't. He knows that Kyle would be firmly on his side if he wasn't hacking out a lung every 25 minutes to prove that the house was, in fact, dusty. “And we’re looking for what? Ghosts? I’m sorry, fellas, but it looks to me like we’re out of luck.” 

“I think he’s right, Adam. We’ve been here for two hours and we don't have anything.” Bobby turns the camera off, letting it rest by his side. He always got surprisingly good footage from something small and handheld. Bobby lets his eyes linger up the hallway, just as Adam disappears into a room right at the end.

“Come on, you’re ruining the fun.” Adam says from a distance. Kyle lets out another cough and Roddy chuckles at him.

“I’m not really sure what the fun is, if I’m being perfectly honest.” Roddy says, leaning back against a wall. It makes a terrible noise as his weight presses against it and he backs off quickly before he goes through it. The structural weaknesses in that house were just disgusting.

“Holy shit!” Adam calls out, stepping backward out of the room. Bobby, Kyle and Roddy look up quickly to him, his attention firmly on the room he was just in. Kyle turns his flashlight on and shines it Adam’s way. “Oh my God, did you see that?”

“See what?” Bobby asks, his grip on his camera tightening. Adam screaming for any reason was never pleasant, as he tended to be the loudest of the group, but the way his eyes were wide open and his attention was fixed on the room didn’t settle well with him.

Kyle moves his flashlight beam down, revealing a very old doll, in rather poor shape, lying at Adam’s feet. If they remembered correctly, which they did, the hallway hadn’t had a thing in them but all four of them. “Adam, why are you playing with dolls?”

“I’m— what? No, no, it landed here when I was coming out of the room, did you catch that?” Adam turns his head, his flashlight blinding his crew. Bobby turns his head away, Roddy shields his eyes with his palm and Kyle bends down to cough again. “You weren’t rolling? Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Sorry.” Is all Bobby can say, looking down at the camera in his hand. With the piss poor lighting, it’s not like he would have caught the act of a doll being thrown at Adam anyway, if that even happened at all. He brings it back up and turns it on as Kyle keeps the hallway lit up bright for a decent shot. He moves closer to Adam to get a better shot.

Adam doesn’t really know what to say as he aims his flashlight back at the doll. He bends down to pick it up, making the hand of it wave at the rest of the crew. “Say hi to the audience! Since my camera guy was slacking, this is all they’re gonna get!” If it’s a ploy to make Bobby guilty, it isn’t about to work anytime soon.

“We’ll get something else. Come on.” Kyle says, already turning away from everybody and making his way back downstairs. Adam looks down at the doll in his hand and sets it back on the floor where it had landed.


	2. the demon scream

When it comes to hunting ghosts, you need to be persuasive toward them. They didn't just show up because they could tell people were in their houses; that would have been pretty stupid, to be quite honest. They needed to be prompted. You needed to engage with them to get them to engage with you in the first place. It was common courtesy to extend. Plus, sometimes you could catch a very interesting response, which really made the whole experience worth it.

Kyle had watched plenty of ghost hunting shows before he had gone into the business for himself. There was more to being a ghost hunter than just having some equipment and a really good haunted house. You needed to have a lot more equipment than previously expected, which the team got, and you needed to know how to speak to spirits. The TV shows taught him that it boiled down to respect, and a good attitude toward the dead. 

He could have managed that, had it procured results. When he, Adam, Bobby and a more reluctant Roddy set up in a supposedly haunted house, with their pounds and pounds of elaborate ghost hunting technology running, waiting to catch something, they were all pretty kind, very respectful, and came in with positive attitudes. Except Roddy, but Kyle didn't think Roddy had any sort of positivity about his job in the first place. 

They asked questions and waited patiently for answers, but they always turned up pretty empty. Adam had even gone as far as to thank any spirits in the room for their time, though Kyle was pretty convinced that the ghosts hadn't even considered them important enough.

So Kyle decided that if being nice to ghosts was producing little to no results, perhaps he would have to use force. It was only fair to try both sides of the spectrum. 

The house they were investigating supposedly belonged to something a little more malevolent than any of the places they had seen before. Kyle had never had a standoff against a demon, so he was pretty thrilled by the whole thing.

“Okay, so, I talked to a priest before we came here, and he said that we should limit conversation as much as we can. Demons aren't too fond of talking as they are of acting.” Adam told them as they made their way around the first floor of the old place. He had always tried to experience new horizons with hunting the supernatural, but this was pushing it.

“You hear that, Roddy?” Bobby says, and Roddy’s head whips around to give him a confused look. “You can't be such a downer in this place.”

“Or something might throw a lamp at you.” Kyle laughs, clapping Roddy on the shoulder and giving him a little shake. Roddy cracks a smile and shakes his head.

“I’ll believe that when it happens.” He says, shaking Kyle’s hand off of him. He pushes open a bedroom door slowly, a loud creak fills the house as the group falls into silence.

“Hey, demon fuck, how’s it going?” Kyle all but shouts as he enters the room, and Adam and Bobby turn simultaneously toward him, their eyes wide in shock. Roddy’s hand moves to his mouth to stifle a laugh. “What?”

“What are you doing?” Adam hisses, his voice quiet as to not disturb anything. Kyle did a good enough job of that as is. 

“I’m trying something new.” He offers a shrug as though screaming at demons was a casual thing to do. “Come on! Don’t be a wimp! We don't have all day!”

“Kyle!” Bobby says, raising his voice. Adam pinches the bridge of his nose and shakes his head. “Why don't you go scream in the hallway, away from our ears?”

“Fine. You're so closed-minded.” Kyle turns back toward the hallway, having barely entered the room, and sits down at the top of the stairs. He couldn't help that his new strategy wouldn't be welcomed by the group.

“Hey, demon. I’m Kyle, and I want to point out that I hate this house. It's gross — I don't know how you live in this.” Kyle twirls a flashlight in his hands, looking around the open space. There's cobwebs growing in the corners of the room and across the banister, which he doesn't care for.

“You want to do something, or are you a coward?” If Adam were in the room, he would have whacked Kyle across the head for his comments. “This house is pretty lame, and you're not helping.”

The house stays quiet, except for a noise from where the others are. Kyle just wants some sort of results. 

“You're such a coward, you know that?” He says loudly, tapping his flashlight against the floor. “Come on, poke me in the eye. Hit me with something. Tug my shirt.”

The demon listens, much to Kyle’s surprise, and a sharp push sends him rolling down the stairs, landing hard on the carpet at the bottom. He groans, trying to pull himself to sit up. Adam, Roddy and Bobby come running as they hear the noise.

“Kyle, oh my God, what happened?” Bobby calls to him, sprinting down the flight of stairs to him. They all but abandoned their equipment.

To their surprise, Kyle laughs, falling back on the floor. Adam and Bobby share a puzzled look. Roddy stands at the top of the stairs, laughing along with Kyle.

“You missed out on some good footage, Bobby. My theory was right. The meaner you are, the more a ghost interacts with you. And you thought it was a bad idea.”

Bobby knows it was a bad idea, and so do the others. Good ideas don't get you pushed down stairs. 


	3. the shattered glass

It wasn't just Adam and Kyle who did their research before they started working. Bobby knew that he should be at least somewhat on their level when it came to joining in the ghost hunt.

When it came to levels of belief, Bobby couldn't exactly say he was sold on the whole thing. It wasn't that he thought there was no such thing as ghosts, he just liked the concrete evidence more than the possibility of them. It was all up in the air, as people had disputed the reality of the supernatural for years and years.

He liked his job. Technician and one of the alternating cameramen on the show was nice. Between himself and Roddy, they caught some interesting stuff, though not much of it could be considered proof. Being a cameraman meant that he had to catch as much as he could, as quickly as possible. The cool thing to him was the idea of being the guy who finally catches ghosts on camera. The credibility would be inspiring.

Evidence would have helped him believe a little more than he had previously, which wasn't much. Adam and Kyle had both claimed to have their own unique experiences with ghosts, hence why they were so firm in their belief. Thing was that they didn't need the evidence to believe. They started the show because they already had total faith without backup; they just wanted the confirmation too.

He and Kyle had stayed up late one night watching ghost shows on TV, taking notes of all the little tricks they did when they hunted, the way they spoke, and the way they got spirits to interact. There seemed to be a convenient lack of video evidence to support their claims, everything cool happening off camera. He didn't want that on the show. An audience deserved to see something interesting. Something real. 

The new place they were investigating was the most unsettling one they had ever been to. Adam had given up on houses, at least for the moment, and instead decided to take their investigation outdoors, into some locations that offered much more to see and interact with.

“I don't like amusement parks all that much, y’know?” Bobby says, shining his flashlight around the main area, trying to keep his hands in his pockets.

“You're a downer. I like this place a lot.” Kyle says from a few feet away. Bobby turns his head to see Kyle walking across a merry-go-round, running his hands across the unicorn-shaped seats. He sees that their blue and yellow paint jobs had worn away over years of neglect, and the poles had rusted over. “It's got life in it.”

“Those are spirits you’re feeling, Kyle, my man.” Adam perks up from the front of the group, walking backwards so he can see his team. “There's something here; I can feel that in my gut.”

“We did just eat,” Roderick says from behind the camera. “You might just be full.”

“Ha, very funny, Roddy.” Adam sticks his tongue out at Roddy. “I mean it. They build an amusement park on top of some kind of factory explosion and expect it to be okay. There's something here that's much bigger than us.”

Bobby shines his light upward at a rollercoaster, rickety, made of wood that was decades old. It was only natural that Adam expresses interest in checking it out. 

“I think I’ll stay on the ground, but you three have fun climbing that thing.” He shakes his head at them. The last thing he wanted was for his friends to break their necks for the show. Adam promises to not go high up. “I’ll check out the ticket stand. Maybe there's something in there.”

There was a platform where people would board the coaster, hosting nothing but a beaten up cart and a red terminal where they manned controls. Adam, Kyle and Roddy step onto the track, making a slow climb up a very small drop, while Bobby scans the terminal. There wasn't much to say about it. The state of the controls was awful, as expected. He couldn't imagine how the inside of that panel looked.

Bobby brushes his hands across the controls, shining his light across them to get a better look. One of the buttons was missing from its spot, and there was a harsh dent in the roof of the terminal. 

He hears a snapping sound from the track and his head shoots up, shining his light around him.

“Guys? Are you okay?” He calls out.

“Never better!” Roddy yells back. He knew Roddy wouldn't lie about it if something had actually happened to anyone, so he allows himself to breathe.

Just as he took his breath, he hears a heavy clunk from in front of him. Bobby shines his light up, catching harsh glare off of the thick pane at the front of the terminal. 

“Hello?” He calls out to the air, expecting a response and not getting one.

It was stupid, he thinks. It was old, and there were three guys walking around on the track. Of course it would make noise. That should have been something he was prepared for beforehand. His light casts back down at the control panel. He pushes a button and, of course, nothing happens. It was probably rotted away inside. There's a lever, and he flips it.

Something hits the glass as the lever is flipped, and Bobby nearly jumps out of his skin, pressing against the barrier behind him. There is a spiders web-like crack in the pane of glass, stemming from a harsh dent in the very center. He knows for a fact that something had broken it in the seconds he looked away. 

“What the hell?” Bobby’s hand moves up to the glass, tracing his finger around one long crack in the glass that extends as far as the corner. Just as his fingertip meets the corner, something strikes it again, and this time, the glass shatters into pieces across the control panel. Bobby steps back, moving quickly out of the terminal and onto the track. He can feel his heart pounding in his chest as he tries to climb up after the other three.

“Hey, Bobby!” Kyle waves to him, standing proudly at the top of a small drop in the track. “Get bored down there?”

“No, I–” Bobby pauses, watching Adam lean over the track and scan the height it catches with his flashlight beam. “Were one of you throwing shit at the terminal?”

“No?” Adam says, looking over at him. “We’ve all been here.”

“Jesus. I’m pissed I didn't take a camera with me. Something hit the glass— broke it into a ton of pieces. I thought it was one of you fucking with me.”

“Not a chance. I’m pissed too.” Adam says, turning back to scan the rest of the track. “That would have been gold for the show. We’ll check out your broken terminal on the way out though, okay? We’ve gotta see that.”

Bobby doesn't respond, just nods and turns to Roddy, who’s focused on Kyle taking long steps back toward him. Maybe the best evidence wasn't captured on camera for a reason. Whatever that reason was, he thanked his lucky stars he got out of there as fast as he could.


	4. the guiding light

When the concept for _Undisputed_ was discussed the first time, Roderick felt like he didn't really have a place in the conversation except for the fact that Adam would have probably wanted him as their reliable cameraman or something. In their very first meeting, Roddy made it exceptionally clear that he didn't believe in ghosts, nor did he waste much time thinking about the evidence presented to him on ghosts shows.

Like any movie or television show, things could easily be faked when your production budget was high enough. What he liked was plain fact, and the fact was that there wasn't enough evidence in the world that could make him admit that ghosts exist. 

He wasn't trying to be a downer when it came to the groups enjoyment of their jobs. He let Adam have his theories. He let Kyle run around, trying new tactics to try and get the supposed ghosts to kill him every week. He let Bobby teeter the fence between skeptic and believer — until their trip to the amusement park turned him into a full blown believer with a side of paranoia with him on every trip they went on. He didn't spoil the fun, he just filmed and offered insight when asked. 

Roddy liked the trip aspect of it all. He liked his friends more than he liked investigating houses, so he was completely open to going along with them, filming their show and helping create some of the footage at the same time. That part was enjoyable. 

That, and he found a lot of things funny about what he did. It was easy to startle Adam, so he tended to do it a lot. Kyle had his own shenanigans that kept Roddy firmly entertained. He’d be lying if he said that he didn't find Kyle cussing and taunting the spirits hilarious. He found Adam’s reaction to it even funnier.

“This is the one, boys. I have a really good feeling about this place.” Adam claps his hands together, staring up at the hotel room’s door. He bounces into every step, so excited by the prospect of finally catching the footage he wanted since he made the show.

Roddy doesn't understand why he’s so jumpy. It's not like they were going to get anything. They hadn't before. Luck never seemed to be on their side as they had always had their own encounters when cameras weren't around.

“We can keep a camera rolling all night, and nobody needs to hold it this time. So this is a special episode where our lovely audience is gonna see all four of us at work at the same time.” Adam beams, his hand on the door handle. He unlocks the door and pushes it open, feeling a chill the second he steps in.

“So, there was an actual murder in this room?” Kyle steps in, looking around at the room. It was fairly large, with a king size bed in the middle of the room. They had brought sleeping bags in case everyone didn't fit in the bed.

“In the very bed we’re sleeping on, Kyle. They changed the mattress and sheets, mind you, but it's the same frame.” Bobby shakes his head, clearly grossed out by the idea. “I gotta say, I don't like how this room feels.” 

“It's pretty cold. I said you should wear a coat, but nobody listens to me.” Roddy says, shaking his head. Adam rolls his eyes and groans dramatically like he was being scolded by his mom.

“Shall we try talking to someone?” Adam pulls a small flashlight from his pocket and sets it on the bed, the light facing the camera. “I think we should try something a little simpler this time. Let’s ask this baby to turn some lights on.”

“Should you be calling ghosts ‘baby’?” Kyle asks. Adam looks over at him with a smile pulling at his lips. “It's not very respectful. And you get mad at me for not respecting the dead.”

“Touché.” Is all Adam can say. Roddy sets the camera down on the bedside table so it catches a good view as they all kneel on the floor around the flashlight.

“Hello,” Bobby says to the open space. Roddy can't help the look he gives to the camera. Every since investing in a much better camera, with better features that allowed them to shoot scenes in the dark, Roddy’s been having more fun giving looks to the audience. “We were told to try and establish polite contact. You’ll have to excuse this one,” he nudges Kyle beside him. “I don't think he knows how to.”

“Dude, I’ll be nice this time.” He says, rubbing his upper arm where Bobby’s elbow met. “We just want to ask how you feel about us sleeping in this room where you died. I wouldn't be cool with that, but that's me.”

“There's a flashlight on the bed here. We know you’ve got enough power to turn it on. We want you to use this to contact us. We’ll ask some questions, you answer accordingly. Cool? Alright.” Adam sounds totally confident going in, as he always was. It was something he had really grown into. 

“Are you the spirit of the person who died here? Turn the light on for yes, leave it off for no.” They wait and watch the light, but nothing happens. Either it was not in the mood to answer polite questions, or they were going to need to talk to someone about a second death in that room that they weren't informed of. 

“Alright, cool, thanks.” Roddy says, almost deadpan, and Adam rolls his eyes again. He knew Roddy would never go out of his way to engage positively with spirits, but he was a decent sport most of the time.

“Turn the light on if you want us here, in this room.” Adam asks to the darkness. They remain in the darkness, the light not so much as flickering. Whatever might have been there was clearly giving them the cold shoulder. 

Roddy can't help the smile that crosses his face. He feels like they're doing it all wrong. If he had been murdered and was now somehow a ghost, he wouldn't want four dumbasses with cameras and flashlights hanging out where he died. It was simple.

“I’ll bet you don't want us here.” Roddy says, and the three turn to him. They look pretty surprised that he’s going out of his way to talk to the spirits, as he mostly spent time casting doubt or simply staying quiet. “I, like my friend Kyle, wouldn't be cool with this happening. Turn the light on if you don't want us here.”

A miracle happens on _Undisputed_ that night. The flashlight rolls a few inches and flickers, the light dim at first, but slowly glowing brighter and brighter, lighting up the room. Adam’s face is priceless, his eyes blown wide in surprise, his jaw dropped. Kyle and Bobby share a look of delight as the flashlight stays lit up bright.

“Are we all seeing what's happening here, gentlemen? We are catching actual evidence, right here, right now.” Adam cannot contain the joy in his voice. “Holy shit, we are catching ghosts.”

Roddy wants to answer something snide, like normal. It was such a tradition that it surprises even him that himself that he opts to stay quiet.

“I’m seeing it, man, and I am loving it.” Kyle says with a big smile on his face, his hand firmly wrapped around Bobby’s wrist, though the cameras can't see that. 

Roddy nods and hums with them, instead of giving any sort of patronizing response again. Here was the thing: he likes his friends more than he likes haunted houses. It was making his friends happy that they were catching something for the first time. Even if he didn't personally believe it was anything special, they did. It wouldn't have been fair to spoil it for them.

All Adam had wanted to do since he created the show was to catch some sort of evidence on camera. That was really it. It was his night to have the last word in. 

Roddy smiles at the excitement of his friends, and sits by quite content with the night as they ask questions to the dark bedroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well this was fun! This was a really spontaneous idea I had after an NXT binge and I really wanted to make it a reality. This chapter, and the series on a whole, is a very obvious nod to Buzzfeed Unsolved, which was a big inspiration behind this. I had a lot of fun writing this, and it's definitely one of my favourite things I've ever written.


End file.
